Massive 24 Points As 2nd XI Dominate Local Derby

Wellington 2nd XI clinched victory over local rivals Bridgnorth in a highly one sided affair at Cricket Meadow to take them out of the bottom two.

On a surprisingly hot day in Shropshire the 2nd XI arrived in Bridgnorth with high anticipation of a close game with the opponents 5th in the table and Wellington taking a very strong team hoping for a win to lift them out of the relegation zone. With all players fired up for the local derby, Wicketkeeper Matt Shawcross had to approach the opposition and interrupt them during their warm up to inform them that pace bowler Stewart Black had broken the stump whilst warming up. This brought fear into the eyes of the majority of the opposition, other than ‘Peter Griffin’ who still, has not been witnessed smiling by any player in world cricket.

Captain Steve Moules won the toss and elected to bat on a wicket that had previously produced over 800 runs in the fixture between Shropshire and Dorset in their four day game earlier in the week.

With the opposition sitting fairly high in the league standings, in form opening partners Sam Lloyd and Tom Saunders were expecting a fearsome bowling attack to be enforced on them with runs hard to get, however, this was not the case. Lloyd started his innings in a surprisingly quick manner timing some lovely cover drives to get Wellington off to a good start. However, Saunders, who later supported a very skimpy little green number, was dismissed early on for 5 after timing a perfect straight drive, unfortunately straight to mid off’s hands. This brought young Dan Vaughan to the crease who has shown a lack of form recently but batted extremely patiently and confidently with Lloyd to build a good partnership before he was dismissed by an excellent catch in the covers for 27, bringing Richard Benting to the middle; who (as per usual) started as he meant to go on by crashing the first ball over extra cover, however, due to the length of the boundary on that particular part of the ground, it did not trouble the umpires as Benting had to run a three!! After a quick 18 Benting was bowled which, I can assure you, would have landed on Sainsbury’s roof if he had connected with it. Nick Mitchell was next in as the young Aussie was brought down to side to get some runs. Lloyd went on to make his third consecutive half century in as many games, even including an awfully attempted Jos Buttler ramp over the keeper (which he missed) when he was on 36 and a couple of dropped catches by the opposition, Lloyd produced a variety of excellent shots and deserved the half century. He was later caught behind for a well made 64. The 4th wicket partnership between Mitchell and the incoming Matt Shawcross had a selection of good running and big hitting (from Peaky) who deciding to take the lead role in the partnership by smashing 90* with Shawcross, who has also been struggling for form, looked confident and supported Peaky well with 36* to leave Wellington 254-4 off their allotted 50 overs.

After a very good feed from tea, Wellington entered the field full of confidence after the batting display. Opening bowlers Stinson and Ward bowled tight and put the pressure on the opening batsmen which forced them to attempt to make a quick single towards backward point, however, not noticing that backward point was young Peaky the batsmen at the non-strikers end called for the run but the young Aussie picked up the ball and made no hesitation and with one stump to aim at, hit the base of the stumps and ran the opener out, much to the delight of captain Steve Moules as he was scampering from mid-wicket to back up the throw. Both opening bowlers finished their spells off with Stinson finishing 2-17 off his 9 overs and Ward finishing with 1-24 off his 12 overs. The captain then turned to young spinner Dan Lloyd and seamer Stewart Black to try their efforts in getting the wickets to win us the game, which they did. Black bowled a fearsome spell from the top end leaving him with figures of 3-26 off his 8 overs including two ‘yorkers’ and a smartly taken catch from Ward. Lloyd bowled tight from the other end, even picking up a wicket which saw the batsmen inside edging a ball onto Shawcross’s pad, which flicked into his brothers hands at first slip. However, the eagerly anticipated moment in the innings was when the fielding side witnessed ‘Peter Griffin’ striding to the crease at number 11. Even with the entertainment being offered in the field by the Wellington players and the enjoyment we were showing, he was still succeeding to look as unhappy as ever; even so when he was dismissed by Lloyd with a smart catch behind from Shawcross which meant Wellington won the game by 153 runs as Bridgnorth were all out for 101.

The result meant that Wellington came out of the bottom two, however, the main aim will be to get out of the bottom four of the table as that is how many go down. Wellington host bottom of the league side Smethwick next week on ladies day (much to the delight of the captain) hoping to pick up another 24 points with only being 10 points adrift off 5th from bottom.